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Oct 19, 2023

Vision Pro: Apple is ignoring one of the fundamental truths of augmented reality.

Apple’s video demo of its new Vision Pro AR/VR headset on Monday started how you

Apple's video demo of its new Vision Pro AR/VR headset on Monday started how you might expect: The user strapped on the chunky goggles and was presented with a menu of familiar apps—Safari, Photos, Messages. But it quickly became clear that the headset was not merely being pitched as a device for individual computing. "Foundational to Apple Vision Pro," the demo noted, "is that you’re not isolated from other people." It was striking how often the visuals and language in the promotion video keyed in on social interactions. Several times, the Vision Pro pitch showed the headset wearer casually interacting with smiling friends or with their kids, as if nothing was weird about a person wearing high-tech scuba gear around others.

Even as an Apple fanboy, I’m skeptical about the presentation's perfectly manicured social reality. I am optimistic about wearable headsets for specific use cases, such as creating digital stories, education innovation, or playing games in solitude. But my skepticism about Apple's ability to create, as it promises, "a profound new way to be together" comes from my experience with a similar (if much lower-tech) device: Google Glass, which my classes at Lehigh University experimented with almost 10 years ago. My students quickly discovered social downsides for these devices; their intrusiveness made for awkward or downright hostile social interactions.

Vision Pro is shinier and fancier than Glass, and its features and quality are dramatically improved. Still, its design replicates a specific social dynamic in the way it presents to those around the user: It's a wearable headset with an embedded camera that can take pictures or video on demand. All the selling points of Vision Pro are things for the wearer to experience—and those around the wearer to simply be subject to.

Apple's offering thus faces the baggage left by Glass, which initially launched to curiosity but was quickly taken over by paranoia. Wearers began to be referred to as "Glassholes" because of the awkward ways they behaved in public (the term inspired a pretty funny SNL skit). To be fair, some of that derision was deserved; a small set of Glass users were aggressive boundary-breakers who wore the device in settings such as public bathrooms. But regardless, Glass became a punchline that has since weighed on other AR products.

That's one of the things that made Monday's Vision Pro presentation feel weird. Visually showing what a product is supposed to be is a long-term Apple strategy, and can speed adoption by allowing consumers to envision themselves using a device. This works well for new product categories, when the public is effectively a blank slate. But the choice to show Vision Pro as a social device ignores the lessons from Glass about the impact of AR and VR tech on social interaction and the larger social narrative around such devices. During the Apple presentation, we saw a father squatting on the floor near his young children, wearing the device and capturing video for keepsakes. It all felt weirdly dark in its unspoken assumptions about normalcy and social consent, and how our kids (and many other people) might feel being constantly regarded through a lens.

In 2013, I was one of the first batch of Google Glass Explorers (yes, that was the official name) given exclusive early access to the device as beta testers. I wanted to test Glass’ potential for both education and journalism, and I used my multimedia class at Lehigh to experiment with new types of visual stories. Glass had working apps for things such as maps and gaming, all visible through a rectangular, transparent screen that hovered slightly above your right eye.

But the critical Glass feature was the built-in camera, capable of capturing good-quality photos and video. My students did a lot of photo and video work with the device. That included mini-stories we called "Glassumentaries," with footage shot by the subject while wearing Glass so you could see a story through their eyes. My students created fun process stories about niche talents like woodworking and glass-blowing. I’m quite fond of what we did creatively.

It was their other assignment, a social exercise, that showed the trouble with wearable camera devices. For the assignment, each student was required to wear Glass everywhere while awake for two days (in class, with their roommates, at the gym, etc.), and afterward journal about their interactions. They were instructed not to take photos or video of others without permission, and to be upfront that they were wearing it for a class assignment. They also could power it down while wearing it if someone was uncomfortable, disabling the camera for social reasons.

Even with these explanations, and with the device powered down, students told me people around them didn't know how to react after their initial curiosity for the tech wore off. Professors in class or friends at parties were nervous about being recorded. Even when people knew the student, turning off the device wasn't always enough. A few times I had to text permission to remove Glass because the social costs were too high. My students were troupers, and they kept at it, even sending me selfies while wearing the device at parties with messages like "#omgawkward." But they estimated it was off probably 75 percent of the time.

The point of this assignment was to test the range of how society might accept the act of wearing such a device in public spaces. We discovered that the device had some good potential, but it was antisocial by nature—after all, it's technology on your face that interferes with your ability to look someone in the eye, and thus severs connection. The bulkiness and dark tint of Vision Pro exacerbates that problem. You might think this isn't so different from the way we ignore friends or family while looking down at our phones, or seeing the world through our phone cameras. But my students’ experiences taught me otherwise.

First, it's easier to visually cue a shift in attention from phone to friend. You can lower the phone, pocket it, or raise your eyes to communicate you are present. In Vision Pro or Glass, that signaling is much harder—the people outside of the device can't know what you’re looking at inside it. Handheld cameras or phones also come with clearer, universally understandable cues: Holding the device a certain way says, "I’m taking photos or a video." Those cues disappear with a wearable camera. The price of these devices also creates an inherent exclusiveness and power imbalance. On the other hand, the relative accessibility and ubiquity of phones mean we all have similar opportunities to do good or ill, a type of mutually assured destruction that encourages constructing social norms around use.

Will Oremus

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Communication theorist Marshall McLuhan famously observed that "the medium is the message," challenging us go beyond the awe phase of new technology and ask questions about its social effects. What does it mean to have a society with this new tech, and how does its introduction change us? The takeaway from our Glass experiment was that wearable headset cameras create burdens on those around the wearer, making social interactions awkward and inviting distrust where none previously existed.

Social interactions could evolve as wearable headsets become more common. It happened as phones became part of our social gatherings. But instead of accepting ever-present phones without conditions, we created rules to govern interactions.

As with Glass, Vision Pro will have interesting uses. It has appeal for gaming and media use. I could see journalistic and creative uses, so long as there is understanding and a way to negotiate consent when donning the device.

But for casual social use, Apple is asking people to envision a future that seamlessly (and quickly) creates social norms about wearables and consent. The visceral reaction Vision Pro wearers will inevitably get in public is a sharp departure for a company famous for products such as iconic white earbuds or candy-colored iMacs, expertly designed to exploit people's desire to build social influence. In classic Steve Jobs fashion, Apple's pitch zoomed past the awkward phase and straight to the story it wants to get to, one about building social capital, influence, and connection through a device. But this time it was for a product whose category is littered with instances of disconnection and paranoia.

Vision Pro may someday live up to Apple's lofty pitch, but acceptance that leads to mass adoption will depend on how users behave, and social rules around new technology take time. We can't shortcut the awkward phase if we want to build social norms for AR/VR devices—and it will all be much messier than Monday's pitch implies.

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.